Many radio telecommunication systems utilize diversity reception to facilitate reliable detection of received radio signals in radio receivers. There are numerous alternative solutions for implementing the diversity reception in the radio receiver. The radio receiver may be configured to utilize at least one of the following diversity reception schemes: spatial diversity, polarization diversity, etc. Generally in the diversity reception, radio signals traveling through a plurality of separate signal paths to the radio receiver are received at separate reception branches in the radio receiver and processed in order to acquire payload data from the received radio signals. Each reception branch may include separate receiver components, and the power consumption of the radio receiver is typically increased upon activation of the diversity reception. This may not be a critical factor in radio receivers connected to a mains power supply, but it may be crucial in portable radio receivers relying on battery power supply. Therefore, there is a need for providing an intelligent control mechanism for diversity reception so as to employ the benefits of the diversity reception while keeping the power consumption of the radio receiver at a tolerable level.